The Amorettes – King Tuts Wah Wah Hut, Glasgow – 12/12/14

Gill Montgomery
Gill Montgomery

The Amorettes are a Scottish band I have seen once before supporting another local Scottish band Attica Rage just two years ago, but this time The Amorettes have their own headline slot. The night meant there would be a larger setlist, and a lot of this would be new, with songs coming from The Amorettes forthcoming album “Game On“. The first four songs had me taking photographs on the night so I couldn’t take in everything then, but I could quickly see how fast flowing and rocking they were.

New song “Grab The Bull By the Horns” was a solid kick ass hard rock number which had lots of nice charismatic movement from bass player Heather McKay, who had donned dark black colours for the night, along with black style make up. Next song “Time Flying By” had more of the same with great guitar licks from Gill Montgomery, who tonight was wearing tight denoms and a rather nice Van Halen Tee shirt. The crowd were completely up for the gig tonight, and were moving and dancing to the rhythm, I even noticed one of the venue security moving, dancing and tapping his leg most of the night!

Fire at Will” had a start that was reminiscent of Guns and RosesYou Could Be Mine”. This also had a slight punk element with great backing vocals from bassist Heather. This song hit hard and heavy! Older track “Whoot Whoo!” seemed to be a crowd favourite and pleaser with people whistling and singing along to this one, with a great round of applause at the end.
“Give ‘Em Hell” sounded so immense with a nice drum opening with heavy rhythms and fantastic grooves from Hannah McKay in the drums department and sister Heather accompanying heavily on the bass. The crowd went nuts over this track.

Heather McKay
Heather McKay

What you get when watching The Amorettes live is song after song of intense high energy rock and roll and hard rocking. It never lets up, and this continues with what Gill described the first song they wrote together as a band, “Talk Nerdy To Me”. Rock and Roll infused with punk and I am really loving the grooves here, This must be a fan favourite with a good fan presence hanging around the stage barrier and clapping just before the main solo. Some nice AC/DC riffage going on here!
Gill introduced her favourite song “Son of a Gun” with it’s nice intricate guitar intro leading into screeching Van Halen-esque style of playing. I can understand why she loves it. The band are non-stop high on energy tonight and it is fun to watch the whole crowd also feeding off of this and getting into the groove.

Another new song “Daddy’s Got Money” had a slight technical issue at the start which the guitar tech quickly sorted out. This had a heavy rocking groove complete with a fantastic solo. The crowd were foot stomping and head shaking throughout this one. Penultimate song had Gill asking the crowd “Do you like it hot? Do you like it heavy? This one is Hot and Heavy”. This had the crowd singing along to the chorus to a great heavy rock and roll number. Heather kept the bass lines simple but it hit you right in between the ribs! The music volumes lower where the crowd shout out “Hot and Heavy” and Gill lets us know at the end she “needs a fucking drink”. I’d say they all deserve to get tanked up after that performance. One more song to finish, as the band return after a short encore break, is a cover of Sam the Sham and the Pharaoh’s Wooly Bully”. As nice as it was, it was ever so slightly weaker than their own material but was fun to hear nonetheless.

Hannah McKay
Hannah McKay

To sum up, what you get when watching The Amorettes live is song after song of intense high energy rock and roll and hard rocking. It never lets up. I did hear a bit of AC/DC, some Van Halen and some other classic rock and roll mixed with some harder rock and an element of punk in places. Time moves so quick due to the pace of the set which is a great thing in my opinion. I have never seen a band give off such a high amount of energy and a sense of fun since I had seen Airbourne a year earlier. The girls are that good. I also love their movements on stage. Heather moves around on the bass and struts about, posing at times and showing emotion. Hannah is thunderous on the drums and Gill has a lot of great guitar skills going on, comfortably fronts and commands the stage as the set moves along. I’m sure The Amorettes are going to become a lot bigger very soon and be around for a long, long time. With some more headline shows to come and a massive support slot supporting Europe and Black Star Riders across the UK and Europe, things have never looked better for these feisty threesome with lots of attitude!

Setlist

1. Shoot From The Hip
2. Get What’s Coming
3. Take Cover
4. Box Ticker
5. Bull By The Horns
6. Too Much Is Never Enough
7. Rock Me, Roll Me
8. Heartbreaker
9. Fire At Will
10. Whoot Whoo!
11. Pop Goes The Weasel
12. Give ‘Em Hell
13. Talk Nerdy To Me
14. Daddy’s Got Money
15. Son Of A Gun
16. Hot ‘N’ Heavy
17. Wooly Bully

The Amorettes forthcoming second album “Game On”, via Off Yer Rocka Recordings, will be available from 23rd March 2015, and available to pre-order from 22nd February 2015

The Amorettes are:
Gill Montgomery – Guitars/Vocals
Hannah McKay – Drums/Backing Vocals
Heather McKay – Bass/Backing Vocals

Please find The Amorettes at:
www.theamorettes.co.uk
www.facebook.com/theamorettes
twitter.com/theamorettes

The Amorettes will be playing Live on these forthcoming dates:

Feb 14th: The Diamond Rock Club, Ahoghill, Ballymena, United Kingdom
Feb 18th: The Borderline, London, United Kingdom
Feb 19th: Bootleggers, Kendal, UK

Touring with Europe and Black Star Riders below:
March 2: Olympia, Dublin
March 3: Ulster Hall, Belfast
March 5: o2 ABC, Glasgow
March 6: o2 ABC, Glasgow
March 7: o2 Academy, Newcastle
March 8: o2 Academy, Leeds
March 10: Rock City, Nottingham
March 11: Corn Exchange, Cambridge
March 13: Academy, Manchester
March 14: Civic Hall, Wolverhampton
March 15: University, Exeter
March 16: o2 Academy, Bristol
March 18: o2 Academy, Bournemouth
March 19: UEA, Norwich
March 21: Shepherd’s Bush Empire, London

The Amorettes

About Del Preston

So there I am, in Sri Lanka, formerly Ceylon, at about 3 o'clock in the morning, looking for one thousand brown M&Ms to fill a brandy glass, or Ozzy wouldn't go on stage that night. So, Jeff Beck pops his head 'round the door, and mentions there's a little sweet shop on the edge of town. So - we go. And - it's closed. So there's me and Keith Moon and David Crosby, breaking into that little sweet shop, eh. Well, instead of a guard dog, they've got this bloody great big Bengal tiger. I managed to take out the tiger with a can of mace, but the shop owner and his son, that's a different story altogether. I had to beat them to death with their own shoes. Nasty business really. But sure enough, I got the M&Ms and Ozzy went on stage and did a great show.